{"product_id":"0307961524-how_literature_saved_my_life","title":"How Literature Saved My Life","description":"\n\u003cp\u003e“Reading \u003ci\u003eHow Literature Saved My Life\u003c\/i\u003e is like getting to listen in on a really great, smart, provocative conversation. The book is not straightforward, it resists any single interpretation, and it seems to me to constitute nothing less than a new form.” ––Whitney Otto\u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n In this wonderfully intelligent, stunningly honest, painfully funny book, acclaimed writer David Shields uses himself as a representative for all readers and writers who seek to find salvation in literature.\u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n Blending confessional criticism and anthropological autobiography, Shields explores the power of literature (from Blaise Pascal’s \u003ci\u003ePensées\u003c\/i\u003e to Maggie Nelson’s \u003ci\u003eBluets,\u003c\/i\u003e Renata Adler’s \u003ci\u003eSpeedboat\u003c\/i\u003e to Proust’s \u003ci\u003eRemembrance of Things Past\u003c\/i\u003e) to make life survivable, maybe even endurable. Shields evokes his deeply divided personality (his “ridiculous” ambivalence), his character flaws, his woes, his serious despairs. Books are his life raft, but when they come to feel un-lifelike and archaic, he revels in a new kind of art that is based heavily on quotation and consciousness. And he shares with us a final irony: he wants “literature to assuage human loneliness, but nothing can assuage human loneliness. Literature doesn’t lie about this––which is what makes it essential.”\u003cbr\u003e\n  \u003cbr\u003e\n A captivating, thought-provoking, utterly original way of thinking about the essential acts of reading and writing.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eCategories:\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cul class=\"category-tree\"\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBiographies \u0026amp; Memoirs\u003cul class=\"category-tree\"\u003e\u003cli class=\"category-tree\"\u003eMemoirs\u003c\/li\u003e\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\n","brand":"Knopf","offers":[{"title":"Used - Like New","offer_id":47596977782974,"sku":"0307961524-2","price":19.76,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0640\/9689\/5166\/files\/51tsACdz5_L.jpg?v=1780323668","url":"https:\/\/shop.sustainablebooks.com\/products\/0307961524-how_literature_saved_my_life","provider":"Sustainable Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}